Daniel Gallagher's guilty plea on federal corruption charges does not square with his public persona CRISIS IN COUNTY GOVERNMENT

The name of Daniel P. Gallagher's consulting company, The Eagle Group, was the ultimate nod to his alma mater, St. Edward High School, which he has supported vigorously since graduating in 1969.

But his guilty pleas Thursday in U.S. District Court -- where he admitted using the company to funnel bribes -- did not shine with Eagle pride.

Gallagher, 58, and two employees of the county engineer's office -- administrator Kevin Payne and J. Kevin Kelley -- admitted tovarious schemes involving kickbacks and bribes to public officials through The Eagle Group.

The conspiracy involved contracts in the engineer's office and in the Parma schools, where Kelley was on the school board.

Kelley and Payne pleaded guilty to several corruption-related charges in federal court on Wednesday. Gallagher's pleas were part of a deal with federal authorities. In the weeks since the allegations surfaced, Gallagher's close friends and former colleagues have struggled to reconcile the "Danny" Gallagher they knew as a longtime public servant, parishioner and dedicated family man -- a guy whose love for St. Edward's was only rivaled by his Irish pride -- with the image of a smarmy middleman secreting bribesfor greedy politicians.

His attorney and longtime friend James A. Jenkins says Gallagher retired from public service in 2002and got a little "stir crazy" so heformed the Eagle Group consulting company. "But unfortunately, he went down the wrong path," Jenkins said. "He was looking to be a player and to be running with the big dogs."

Jenkins said Gallagher trusted a lot of people who were "shady ethically."

"When you're rubbing elbows with the likes of 'public officials No. 1 and 2', the lines of ethical and unethical tend to get a little blurred," Jenkins said referring to County Commissioner Jimmy Dimora and Auditor Frank Russo. The two men have not been charged with a crime or identified in the charges against Kelley and Gallagher, but descriptions of "Public Official 1" and "Public Official 2" match Dimora and Russo.

A fourth man, Brian Schuman, also pleaded guilty Thursday to conspiracy to commit bribery. Schuman ran Alternatives Agency, a halfway house on East 55th Street. He admitted to paying for first-class airline tickets to Las Vegas for Russo and Dimora in exchange for continued county funding for the halfway house. He could spend about four months in prison.

Former Brook Park Mayor Tom Coyne knew Gallagher's father and has known Gallagher most of his life. He said "never in a million years" would he have expected Gallagher to be embroiled in such a scheme.

Coyne watched Gallagher grow up in Brook Park, where he once headed the city's civil service commission. Coyne, among others, recommended Gallagher as a chief administrator to County Engineer Robert Klaiber, whose campaign Coyne managed in 2000.

Coyne said Gallagher had a solid reputation as a manager and "certainly looked good on paper."

But he said the recent charges show that Gallagher, Payne and Kelley violated the public trust and that they knew what they were doing.

"Unfortunately, for Dan's family," Coyne said, "Dan's going to have to pay the price for that."

Some wonder whether Gallagher's dealings extended beyond his consulting company but Jenkins says Gallagher "never violated the public trust while a public employee."

However, there are questions about credentials listed on his job application with the engineer's office.A degree from Kent State University is listed, but then partially scribbled out. He attended the school from 1960 to 1973 but did not graduate.

Hired in 1973 by the county's probation department, Gallagher rose through the ranks to become a supervisor. He left that office in 1999 to work for former County Recorder Patrick O'Malley before taking the head administrator's job in the engineer's office. He retired from there in 2002. Payne later stepped into that job.

Attorney Norm Incze worked for Gallagher in the probation department and said, as a boss, Gallagher was a demanding disciplinarian, but a straightforward guy.

"I was stunned and absolutely floored, and frankly heartbroken," Incze said after hearing of charges against Gallagher. "He was someone I looked up to and that I would go to for advice."

Jenkins says his friend and client wasn't motivated by greed but bya need to feed the powerful politicians he felt he had to please.

For example, Jenkins said, one of the charges in the filing accused Gallagher of funneling a bribe from a company called "Business 9" to Payne and Kelley. Public records and contracts show that business is the Carbone family construction company. Nobody from Carbone has been charged in this corruption probe.

Gallagher's Eagle group was supposed to do public relations for a Parma School District construction project.

Jenkins said after Gallagher used a payment from Carbone to pay off two public officials, he paid for printing pamphlet materials and paid taxes on the money -- leaving little profit for himself on the deal.

"He was not in it for the money. He was in it to be a player," Jenkins said. "After that, he only made a few thousand in profit on what could have been a lucrative deal for him."

Coyne said many times people commit these types of crimes simply because the opportunity is there.

"Clearly, when you examine this, he wasn't a very good criminal, so it shows he doesn't have much experience at it," he said.

Experience or not, federal guidelines call forGallagher to serve nearly five years in prisonto reflect on his crimes.

Standing before U.S. District Judge Kate O'Malley on Thursday, Gallagher said he had a drinking problem. Gallagher told the judge he has been sober for eight weeks and been participating in Alcoholics Anonymous.

Gallagher also has been taking medications for stress and anxiety for the past three months.

He won't be sentenced right away, Jenkins said. Possibly not until after he testifies against higher-up public officials, if they are eventually charged-- the ones he so desperately wanted to please.

But the fact he besmirched his beloved alma mater in the process will continue to sting, Jenkins said.

"It is an embarrassment to him and he's going through a lot about it," Jenkins said. "But and that pales in comparison to how he's hurt his family."

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